Kathleen Jessie Raine

The Ancient Speech - Poem by Kathleen Jessie Raine

Autoplay next video

A Gaelic bard they praise who in fourteen adjectivesNamed the one indivisible soul of his glen;For what are the bens and the glens but manifold qualities,Immeasurable complexities of soul?What are these isles but a song sung by island voices?The herdsman sings ancestral memoriesAnd the song makes the singer wise,But only while he singsSongs that were old when the old themselves were young,Songs of these hills only, and of no isles but these.For other hills and isles this language has no words.

The mountains are like manna, for one day given,To each his own:Strangers have crossed the sound, but not the sound of the dark oarsmenOr the golden-haired sons of kings,Strangers whose thought is not formed to the cadence of waves,Rhythm of the sickle, oar and milking pail,Whose words make loved things strange and small,Emptied of all that made them heart-felt or bright.Our words keep no faith with the soul of the world.